This customers first tattoo was a gigantic cherry blossom branch on her ribs which took many sessions and hurt like, well, like a rib tattoo. So i was happy to be putting her next one on a nice easy outer arm and finishing it in one session.

She saw a great piece by Eli Quinters of a Victorian lady with a skull head and umbrella in one of the many tattoo books we have in the waiting room. the challenge in this case is to give the client what they want without making a copy of someone elses existing tattoo. The first way to do this is to put away the original photo and not look at it while drawing the new piece, the other is to gather a whole bunch of original reference (in this case pages and pages of victorian dresses) and base my piece from them. And finally the last element is to add my own little tricks and favorite elements.

the result is something that is clearly not a copy while still capturing the feeling and essence of what attracted the client tot he other tattoo in the first place.